Oh Mama Don't You Cry
by rileyjaywinchester
Summary: USA's female U-20 team, Simple Plan, and more than enough on and off the ice drama to make a girl want to drop the gloves before the first whistle. Maybe a few days listening to pop punk might clear their heads before the big game - or maybe it would all go up in smoke. Written with choimyeong.
1. Chapter 1

**Oh Mama Don't You Cry**

_Oh mam don't you cry, USA hockey is do or die!_

_Put a stick in my hands and head on off to a foreign land!_

_Blaise always said I'd be a star, USA hockey will go very far!_

_take the gatorade in your glass, we just kicked YOUR FUCKING ASS!_

"I swear to god Ella, if you don't take off that helmet I'm going to strangle you with stick tape," Andi complained, lazily spinning a roll of white sticky tape around her index finger.

"Not if I get to you first."

It's only the third day of practice before World Juniors takes off in Canada once again, and both girls are absolutely stoked to have made the U-20 team two years in a row, confident that this year they'll actually be on the ice.

"Or what? You're gonna let this turn into an episode of Big Time Rush? I swear, with that helmet, sometimes you're exactly like Carlos. And Carla can get like Kendall sometimes, like fuck, she's serious on the ice. I mean, there's a reason she wears the C and you only have the A, Andi. But then again-" Emily added, not expecting the youngest player on the team to groan beside her.

"Did you really just say Big Time Rush? Again? You know whenever someone mentions-" Breeana chimed in two rows over from the window seat, to which Ella rolled her eyes so violently they all thought she may have detached her retinas.

"If we never flew, we would never fall

if the world was ours, we would have it all," Andi started almost instantly, causing the other two to snicker while Ella tried to avoid joining in, knowing that by the chorus she and Andi would both be in inconsolable fits of laughter thanks to an inside joke that started when they were around 13.

Ella scoffed and stuck some beats into her ears, though she could still hear the words. "I am not laughing at this joke anymore." She tried to bluff, even though she knew exactly how hard she'd be laughing in about 45 seconds.

"We're halfway there, We're looking good now

Nothing's gonna get in the way," Andi was able to sing before her face cracked into another grin and the softest, "You sick bastard," proceeded the next line of the chorus - and just like that, the lyrics turned to laughter, though Ella could still think them through in her head.

"We're halfway there, and looking back now

I never thought that I'd ever say

We're halfway there, we're halfway there," both managed, trying to keep straight faces as eventually others joined in.

"Its funny though," Chelsea laughed from the back of the bus. "We are halfway to Montreal."

"HALFWAY TO MY HUSBAND!" Ella near screeched, sighing happily and looking at her lock screen, swooning at the picture of Carey she had taking up the screen.

"Oh god, and I thought one of you was bad blabbering on about three different teams," *cough* "Andi!* *cough* Breeana continued.

"And Montreal means poutine! FOOD!" Emily.

"AND MY HUSBAND." Ella interrupted.

"...Ella, you know who else is there?" Andi almost singsonged, trying not to grab her phone and blast Still Not Getting Any... so everyone else would get the idea.

"The rest of the Canadiens? Well duh."

"I'm taking music wise."

"Celine Dion?" Emily, Breeana and Chelsea all said at the same time, hi fiving after the mortified expression flitting across Andi's face.

"No you idiots! SIMPLE PLAN!"

* * *

"You know who looks really good in hockey jersey that's not on an NHL team?"

Pretty much everyone draws a blank as they're unpacking, and the room falls quiet.

"Chuck fuckin' Comeau." Andi finishes, not expecting the multiple forehead slaps around the room.

"Oh come on, did you expect me to say anything else?"

"Jesus, Elise, calm yourself. Go take a cold shower or something." Ella called from the other side of the room, marking off her corner territory with all of her bags and goalie gear. She was a messy-clean person, her entire life a controlled chaos.

* * *

The first time out on ice when they arrived reminded them why their relationships with hockey were love-hate. Ella caught a puck to the face about a millisecond after she passed the safety of the barriers. But she went on, bloodied, bruised, swollen cheek and all that fun stuff. Her mask fit her strangely with the welt on her skin, but she ignored it and practiced her blocking and goaltending rituals and moves more times than they ever saw professional players work during warm ups.

She wasn't messing around this year. She was in it to win it, hoping to turn the heads of any scouts who may be checking practices and watching during the games. This was her choice, no matter what anyone said, hockey was what she was doing with her life.

At five foot two she was quite vertically challenged for a goalkeeper. She almost didn't make it past the top of the goal net and was too thin to ever reach both sides. But what she lacked in size, she made up for in sheer speed. She could move back and forth and back and forth faster than anyone, and took laps around the rink at near scary speeds. She even made her best friend, Andi, nervous. Andi has known her since they were in middle school. Her first public school friend. But when Ella took those laps, even Andi held her breath, hoping Ella wouldn't fault and come crashing into the unforgiving rink wall.

"One of this days you're gonna pull a Crow and spin out. You're not the one getting checked though, I swear. If I ever took a hit like Kane -" Andi said when the shorter girl finally made it back to the bench, Emily and Carla snickering.

"Dude, you'd be out for the season. Last hit he took was a backcheck to the boards, fractured collarbone and all - surgery put him out 12 weeks."

"Oh god don't jinx it! There goes the hawks winning the-"

"Yeah, like the Wild are any more likely," Ella added with a grin.

"HEY! WE MADE THE DAMN WILD CARD, YOU SHUT YOUR FACE!"

Carla rose a hand between the two, half expecting a stick to the face, "Alright you two. If I have to do this one more time I'm gonna Shawzy both of you into Russia's bench next game."

"Aw sweet! I've never been through into the opponent's bench before!" Andi chirped, trying to keep from smile.

"You're not supposed to be happy about that. Dude WHAT THE HE- LOOK LOOK LOOK!" Emily yelled, the entire team turning to look at the entrance to the ice, where, lo and behold, a very familiar person had stepped out, in gear with a more than recognizable last name.

"Oh god, I'm gonna faint, catch me." Andi's two steps from taking a running start over the bench, but Ella grabs the back of her jersey.

"Dude if you say something stupid I'm getting it on video."

"You wouldn't dare."

And yet, when she turned around, Emily already had her camera phone out.

"I hate you all."


	2. Chapter 2

Why David had insisted the boys check out the local rink before the tournament started completely confounded Chuck, it wasn't like they were going to have the rink to themselves, it probably was going to be packed with teams practicing, and if it weren't that - the Simple Plan fans alone were a challenge to deal with at rinks, as nice and polite as they were - it was just the sheer numbers.

Being the first one up from lacing skates and grabbing sticks, Chuck took in the cold air of the upper ground rink with a new look at the situation - it was a day to relax before the new week of writing, the fifth album needed to be worked on and all of the boys knew it.

"C'MON HURRY UP YOU GUYS!" He yelled back down the stairs, David and Seb both calling up to him in annoyed French.

When he got onto the ice and did a few laps just to get used to it (because when was the last time they'd been on ice?), he noticed that it was indeed, mostly empty, save for a small group of girls by one of the team benches, helmets on and all in a heated conversation.

"YOU COMPLETE ARSE HOW DARE-"

"LET'S SEE YOU GET A GORDIE HOWE HAT TRICK THEN - YOU DON'T BREAK UP A JTOEWS FIGHT WHAT THE FUCK WERE YOU THINKING?!"

"FUCKING HORSESHIT FUCKING CALL! PENALTY THAT BASTARD!"

"CAN I THROW THIS ON THE RINK?!"

Vaguely amused by the shouts from the girls, he realized they must have been watching a game on someone's IPad, before the majority of them shrugged and stood up.

"Let's play this for real. Five on three, fights count. Let's show the hawks how to NOT fuck up a powerplay!" he heard the captain of them shout as she jumped the barrier, narrowly avoiding falling on her face.

What the hell did I just skate up into?

* * *

When David and the other three made it upstairs, they all reacted at the clear *smack* of a slapshot colliding with the opposite goal board.

"HEY! LET'S NOT TAKE MY HEAD OFF THIS TIME!" Ella barked as she narrowly avoided the angry puck flying at her.

"Is it just me, or do you hear a girl screaming at someone?" Pierre wondered, sparing a few seconds to wonder why a bunch of probably twenty something girls were on the ice in the first place.

"Dude. U-20 is in a few days. And this is probably one of the teams," Jeff added with a smile, turning around just as another puck hit the wall again.

"DO Y'ALL HAVE NO AIM?!" The same voice yelled again, about an eleven on the irate scale. "Some of the biggest moments of our lives are coming up, SUPER fast! We need to actually work. It was funny the first 20 minutes, but we've been practicing for four hours now and haven't really gotten anything done!" The female went on, her emotions about getting onto a national team pushing her forward to come out of her usually quiet-in-a-professional-situation shell.

"No, the first twenty minutes was you having a mental breakdown at the airport because we were in the same city as Carey," Carla turned to Emily, who only passed the puck back to Andi before rehearsing a few play moves.

"YOU SHUT YOUR MOUTH. YOU SHUT IT RIGHT NOW!" Ella could feel like smile creeping onto her lips no matter how hard she tried to fight it.

"This is why it's fun pissing you off. Get you made enough, and there'll be a goalie row. You know how rare though are? Granted that JToews fight earlier was UTTER BULLSHIT but still." Andi added, incidentally sliding along the glass right by the boys, where she promptly turned to wave at them and instead fell, not watching as Emily tried to check the puck from behind.

"There will not be a goalie row." Ella said matter of factly as her best friend went way down, trying her damndest not to laugh.

"Dude watch where the fuck you're going! You can't be distracted like that during a game! DO YOU KNOW HOW MANY SCOUTS WILL BE THERE?! We thought all that fighting over McDavid was bad last year, oh god - THAT'S US THIS YEAR!" Emily had started, before turning around at the same time, clearing the puck back to Ella before helping Andi up, who waved her off.

"We don't need to pull a 1988 moment here, I'm fine."

Ella was lost in her little moment of dreaming about a scout coming to find her, scouts fighting over her and all that, but she was still lucid enough to keep her head going as she shot the puck back towards another player. "Dude, I'm hungry." She stated, getting ready to defend from the yells about her having eaten an entire kringle by herself about an hour ago.

"YOU JUST ATE A FUCKING-"

"DUDE. WE NNNNEEEEDDDD TO GO GET POUTINE LATER!" Andi yelled, not expecting someone to literally skate behind her and grab the puck, and then, like it'd be no-fucking-big-deal, actually hit it and managed to score on Ella, who could only balk.

No matter how fast she moved, the puck flew past her into the net, absolutely stunning her. "Wha.." She balked, before becoming nearly irate that she just missed. "WHAT?!" she wasn't sure what was happening and was almost seeing red.

"ELISE. WHAT WAS THAT. WHY ARE YOU TRYING TO TRICK ME." Ella resorting to throwing around tricks, knowing that that would have been the only way her friend could have shot a goal past her.

"Uh, yeah, dude I'm over here. That wasn't me. I'm not that stupid to rush head on like that."

"THEN. WHO. THE. FU-"

"Hey, Jeff - if these are U-20's, shouldn't it've been a little harder than that to score?" all of the girls heard a boy yell back to one of his friends, before the one Andi had waved at interrupted, "And if they're U-20's, you're going to get yourself killed in. Three. Two. O-"

"GLOVE DROP, EVERYBODY IN!" Carla yelled, instantly ready for the thing they'd been waiting for all day.

Ice fights were the icing on the cake for hockey games, and it was the one sport where it was allowed. Ella grinned viciously as she dropped her gear, the small goalie suddenly becoming very, very intimidating. "Now. I'm giving one chance for someone to point out who shot that goal."

"Not me!" came like five voices at once, Andi the loudest of them before, after a nod from the captain, started a tussle.

Looking around, she probably should've had a heart attack - because although some of the girls had NHL jerseys, Ella knew none of them was wearing a Canadiens one. And yet there was one on the ice, though she didn't recognize the number, so it must've been custom. Which meant someone that didn't play hockey much. She zoned in and looked closer, before slowing skating over, in case it was someone she really didn't want to start a fight with.

And when it finally hit her who it was, she had about three seconds to decide whether or not to punch him. It's really only took her one second before she slid over and her fist connected with the one and only Pierre Bouvier's face. "NO ONE SHOOTS PAST ME." She stated loudly. "NO ONE." She looked at her teammates.

"Yeah. I just fucking did that."


End file.
